The War in North Africa and Europe

Soon after the United States entered the war, the United
States, Britain, and the Soviet Union (at war with Germany
since June 22, 1941) decided that their primary military
effort was to be focused in Europe.

Throughout 1942, British and German forces fought
inconclusive back-and-forth battles across Libya and Egypt
for control of the Suez Canal. But on October 23, British
forces commanded by General Sir Bernard Montgomery struck
at the Germans from El Alamein. Equipped with a thousand
tanks, many made in America, they defeated General Erwin
Rommel's army in a grinding two-week campaign. On November
7, American and British armed forces landed in French North
Africa. Squeezed between forces advancing from east and
west, the Germans were pushed back and, after fierce
resistance, surrendered in May 1943.

The year 1942 was also the turning point on the Eastern
Front. The Soviet Union, suffering immense losses, stopped
the Nazi invasion at the gates of Leningrad and Moscow. In
the winter of 1942-43, the Red Army defeated the Germans at
Stalingrad (Volgograd) and began the long offensive that
would take them to Berlin in 1945.

In July 1943 British and American forces invaded Sicily and
won control of the island in a month. During that time,
Benito Mussolini fell from power in Italy. His successors
began negotiations with the Allies and surrendered
immediately after the invasion of the Italian mainland in
September. However, the German Army had by then taken
control of the peninsula. The fight against Nazi forces in
Italy was bitter and protracted. Rome was not liberated
until June 4, 1944. As the Allies slowly moved north, they
built airfields from which they made devastating air raids
against railroads, factories, and weapon emplacements in
southern Germany and central Europe, including the oil
installations at Ploesti, Romania.

Late in 1943 the Allies, after much debate over strategy,
decided to open a front in France to compel the Germans to
divert far larger forces from the Soviet Union.

U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower was appointed Supreme
Commander of Allied Forces in Europe. After immense
preparations, on June 6, 1944, a U.S., British, and
Canadian invasion army, protected by a greatly superior air
force, landed on five beaches in Normandy. With the
beachheads established after heavy fighting, more troops
poured in, and pushed the Germans back in one bloody
engagement after another. On August 25 Paris was liberated.

The Allied offensive stalled that fall, then suffered a
setback in eastern Belgium during the winter, but in March,
the Americans and British were across the Rhine and the
Russians advancing irresistibly from the East. On May 7,
Germany surrendered unconditionally.